Deen has decorum deficit

Before she died, the grandmother of a friend was widely considered a card — funny, sharp, irreverent and a terrific storyteller.

She was also a racist. The characters in her stories were rarely identified by name, but almost always by race. A former landlord was a dumb Polack; an old neighbor was “that dirty Armenian.” And she used the N-word, with cringe-worthy zest, even when she appeared enamored of the subject of the slur.

This woman was in her late 80s, from a working class background, and her family never tried to correct her. She’s old, went the conventional wisdom. She knows no better. She grew up in a different time and wasn’t about to change.

I thought of this woman while ingesting the scandal surrounding Paula Deen, the latest celebrity embarked on an apology tour, after admitting in a deposition that she’s used the N-word. And I wondered at what point we stop making allowances for ignorance and racial bigotry. Do we excuse people due to age? Education? Geography? If people are raised in a racist culture, are they not expected to evolve?

Deen said in her deposition that she no longer uses the word. Her representatives, meanwhile, said that her use of it in the past was the result of growing up in the South 60 years ago. (Italics mine).The culinary high-cholesterol queen is 66. Does that mean she began using the N-word when she was 6? And when she speaks longingly of the old South as though she were Aunt Pittypat sashaying around Atlanta, are we to conclude that she’s a vampire? Speaking of vampires, one of Deen’s many defenders is Anne Rice, who has written some fine novels about the fanged night walkers. Rice fretted about a lynch mob, while loyal followers are simply dismayed that Deen’s goose is cooked. Hey, y’all, she didn’t mean nuthin’, say her Southern fans. Why, that sweet gal doesn’t have a racist bone in her body. Just last year she introduced a black employee right there up on the stage, sayin’ he was “black as this board.” That’s just Paula bein’ all folksy!

I’ve never been a fan of Deen, as it’s hard enough eating healthy without the influence of Deen’s deep-fried calorie bombs. And her disclosure that she suffered from diabetes came only after she inked a deal as a paid spokesman for a diabetes drug, which now joins the throng of sponsors to drop the beleaguered baker like a hot buttered potato.

Meanwhile, Deen’s handlers have apparently offered this advice for her apology tour: Bawl. And the opportunistic Paula has complied, while appearing strangely obtuse to this teachable moment.

At 86, yeah, my friend’s grandmother was a lost cause. But Paula Deen should have shaped up years ago — she’s well-traveled, wealthy, and had many years to adjust her thinking after passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In her deposition, she said she wanted her brother to experience a plantation-style wedding, complete with black waiters, but decided against it because the media might raise a fuss. That’s telling.

Some claim it would be strange if Paula hadn’t used the N-word, that most people over a certain age have said it before. I disagree. The word is unique in its ability to cause offense; it’s so profane that you assume racism on the part of any white person who uses it.

“I can’t, myself, determine what offends another person,” she said in her deposition. On Facebook, she wrote that it’s easy to persecute “an older, overweight” woman.

But the overweight female card won’t play here. As for her puzzlement over what offends people, I’m guessing she and her Southern apologists have received the message by now.